


Hell and Back

by anticyclone



Category: Good Omens (TV), Hocus Pocus (1993)
Genre: Aziraphale's weird book collection, Be Careful What You Wish For, Crossover, Gen, Hell, Satanist witches, accidental summonings
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-31
Updated: 2019-10-31
Packaged: 2021-01-15 03:42:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,912
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21246914
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/anticyclone/pseuds/anticyclone
Summary: "Perhaps we could assist you with the …subjugation… of this angel," Winifred suggested, which made Crowley groan again and Anathema cringe. Aziraphale just rolled his eyes. "You see, I still have a connection to my Book, and I need to bring it back to Hell with me.""This book? With the eyeball?" Crowley looked at it, and then up at Aziraphale, who smiled at him. The demon turned back to Winifred. "That's not happening."The Sanderson sisters have been in Hell for some three hundred years and have still not had the pleasure of being introduced to Satan. But Winifred thinks she has a way to rectify that, if only she can get her hands on her Book. Luckily, some angel put it on an unprotected shelf, where it's able to find itself a witch.





	Hell and Back

Hell was not all it was cracked up to be.

Winifred knew this because she had now been there some hundred years, and she had still not met Satan.

Not even to thank Him for the Book. Although privately she did waver on that. It would be unconscionably ungrateful not to, of course. One did not look gifts from the Master in the teeth, even when they did not have teeth. But - and here was the private part - the Book had not been in Winifred's possession when she died. _Neither_ time.

So the fact that it had been several hundred years and Winifred had yet to be introduced to Satan was not something that needed to be rectified immediately. Unlike the current issue with Sarah and Mary.

"Sisters," she hissed. "This is not the Witch Enclave. You are out of your bat-feathered brains-"

"Bats don't have feathers," Mary said, looking up.

Sarah giggled and continued her current bout of madness, which was to dig into a lock with a hair pin she must have stolen off one of the more recently deceased witches. In Hell clothes stayed intact and clean, after a fashion. But there were not wardrobe changes. The Sandersons were simply lucky to have had such excellent taste in clothing during life. Some of the other witches, especially the modern ones… Well, Winifred wouldn't use those clothes for rags.

"Did you steal that from Margaret?"

"I didn't not steal this from Maggie," Sarah pronounced. She jabbed the lock again.

Taking a deep breath, Winifred shut her eyes and stared straight ahead. It was difficult to figure out which direction to face while asking the Master for strength, here. For all she knew He was behind her.

Sarah giggled again when Winifred spun around to check … the empty hallway behind them.

The hallway was typical of Hell. Narrow, dirty, gray. In the Witch Enclave there was an endless overgrown forest, filled with bramble and wild creatures with too many horns and only sometimes the suggested amount of eyes. Couldn't throw a stone in it without hitting another witch cottage. If Winifred flung her windows open to sing curses into the air, she could see glimpses of three other cottages through the trees.

It was absolute misery and Winifred didn't even have carousing with demons to make up for it. Throw another stone, hit any number of demonic many-limbed beasts, but since their first days in Hell (both times, after both deaths) Winifred had not entertained the company of a demon for more than five minutes.

"Winnie, I'm sure we'll meet Him any day now."

Really, when she did get an audience with the Master, she would have a thing or two to say about the demons who welcomed new witches to the Enclave. And shut the door behind them.

The door that Sarah was currently trying to break through.

"There aren't days in Hell, Mary." Winifred dug her hands into her skirts. "Both of you are going to come with me right now-"

A quiet _click_ interrupted her.

A less quiet "I did it!" rang through the air as Sarah leapt to her feet and shoved open the doorway to the rest of Hell.

"Who let those idiots out?"

Winifred latched onto Sarah's dress and hauled her backwards. Mary helped.

The procession of demons in front of them were heading in a different direction but came to a halt to stare at the now-open door of the Witch Enclave.

And that was another thing. Demons? Not what Winifred had expected. Oh, yes, the boils, and blisters, and general grime. Nothing uniquely impressive. And that one in the middle, with his hands bound! Not what Winifred had raised her sisters to believe a demon would look like. Skinny denim trousers and dark glasses and that hair? Anyone with incredible red hair, in Winifred's opinion, should know better than to shear it short. He was a disgrace of a demon, also in Winifred's opinion.

And when he looked over at her she would have sworn on her own corpse that he said, "Oh. Winifred Sanderson."

Then one of the other demons slapped the red-headed demon in the back of head. "Shut up, Crowley."

"Yeah, you're here to get judged for treason, not chat it up with witches," said another one, who had an enormous slug on its head and was dripping goo off its shoulders.

The demon who had slapped the first one, Crowley, shoved the slug-goo-demon toward them. "Get the witches back into the pris - the Enclave," she sneered. "And you can watch the trial from behind glass."

"Aww, Beelzebub said I could-"

"Beelzebub said I could," slapping-demon mocked, sing-song. "Get going. Now!"

Slug-goo-demon slunk over to them, muttering what Winifred recognized as a skin-flaking curse. She pulled Sarah back a few inches and said, "Oh, no, we can show ourselves back in, terrible mistake, we were looking for…"

"A two-headed raven with one eye," Mary blurted.

Slug-goo-demon shuddered. "That's where Talgart went? Get back in there before he gets out!"

The door slammed shut behind them. There was even some kind of far off, echoing sound, like a lock sliding into place. A lock much bigger than the one that had been on the door before. The kind of lock that could not be opened with metal hair pins or old-fashioned skeleton keys or even witch-fashioned skeleton keys, made out of actual skeletons.

Winifred was alone with her sisters in the dingy hallway that led into the Enclave. And Sarah was sliding out of her hands to sit on the dirty floor, puddled in her skirts, her lower lip stuck out in a monumental pout.

Winifred took a deep breath and slapped her upside the head.

Sarah clutched herself and cried out. "Winnie, that's not fair!"

"What in the Seven Hells were you thinking-"

"Which Hell do you think we're in, Winnie?"

"Witch Hell, Mary. And you two are here to torture me."

Sarah kicked her feet up and scuttled around, twisting herself up in her skirts, so she could face them and pout more effectively. "I only wanted to meet an incubus, Maggie said there are so many of them, and there's no one interesting here at all!"

"Margaret has no idea how many incubi may or may not be in Hell, none of us do. Clearly the-" Winifred sniffed. "-rank and file demonic citizenry does not appreciate our Earthly contributions in glorifying Master's name. Didn't you hear that one? She called the Enclave a _prison."_

Mary twisted her fingers together. "If it is, it's a … nice prison."

Winifred tapped a finger against her temple. "But that one. That one knew us. Sisters. There must be properly appreciative demons somewhere in the bowels of Hell."

"But we can't get to them. The door's locked," Mary said.

Winifred smiled. Both times they'd arrived here, they'd been escorted down other hallways before ending up in this one, with that door shutting behind them. "There is one other way to get on the other side of that door," she said. "Die."

Sarah dropped her hands to her lap. "Winnie, we're already dead."

"Well, you know what they say." Winifred laughed. "Third time's the charm."

***

Anathema carried a handkerchief when she visited the bookshop. Aziraphale did keep the second floor relatively clean, since he never allowed what Anathema suspected he'd term _attempted customers_ up the stairs, but sometimes there were pockets of sneeze-inducing dust in unexpected corners.

Anathema was allowed up the stairs, because Anathema knew better than to hint she would even dream of taking anything off Aziraphale's shelves. Even though she did. Very much.

She held back, though. She could understand a protective collector. It wasn't as if she'd let people paw through the prophecy notecards or even her supplementary research materials.

So she did not press enthusiasm. When Aziraphale would casually ask if she had ever read Christopher Marlowe's discarded notes for _Doctor Faustus_ or Christina Rosetti's letters to her brother on designs for _Goblin Market_ illustrations, she did not say, "How did you get all of these things? Please teach me," but instead, "Oh, no, but it does sound fun."

And a few times a year, she found herself visiting London and also having tea with an actual, literal angel.

Anathema had thus far been allowed to look at four of Aziraphale's books. It turned out that "No, I've only gotten to read excerpts on Google Books," and also explaining what Google Books was (even though he should remember by now), would not infrequently get her at least Aziraphale showing her the book if not to hold it herself.

Right now Anathema was upstairs. Alone.

Aziraphale had left to answer the landline. She could tell he was talking to Crowley because she'd overheard him say, "I do have the mobile, it's simply charging," at the beginning of the call. At that Crowley had said … something. She'd heard Aziraphale say, "You know I don't find that the least bit intimidating."

She put her tea down and started wandering the shelves. Aziraphale couldn't object to her browsing the books. She wouldn't pick anything up, of course.

And, to be fair, she didn't pull the Book off the shelves. It flung itself on the floor at her feet.

Face-down, too, or else she _never_ would've touched it.

"What on Earth…"

She bent down and adjusted her glasses. The back of it really should have tipped her off. It was hideous leather, clearly damaged in the past for it to have been stitched together. The spine was bizarre. Anathema looked over her shoulder, at the stairs, but there was no sign of Aziraphale returning. She touched her tongue to her teeth and turned back to the book.

It had flipped open.

Anathema skimmed the text. A recipe for a skin-restorative lotion, with really suspect ingredients including actual skin, she didn't see how that might help, and notes on which moons were best for singing a witch's heart out.

"Why do I have the feeling that does not refer to singing your own heart out," Anathema muttered, crouching down. "I am not going to do that and my skin is fine with the lotion I've got, thank you very much. Let's get a better look at you, book…"

Focusing in on auras took some skill. Anathema had kept up with it, even after the failed Apocalypse. She was no longer trying to track evil but that was no reason not to practice. She could still learn about people, after all.

When she blinked that other vision into place, she also fell backwards onto the floor, so hard that her glasses bumped on impact and dropped into her lap.

Not trying to track evil anymore didn't mean it couldn't find her. Even in an angel's bookshop. _Apparently._

"Aziraphale what the hell?"

The aura was no less focused for the loss of her glasses. It was a twisting, writhing mass of gleaming red tentacles. When Anathema blinked several of them wriggled out at her. The tips flashed white and Anathema drew back several inches.

"That is not normal. And I am not interested." She fumbled for her glasses.

The book rattled. Pages flipped one way and then another. The aura stretched out.

She glared and blinked the aura vision off again. "You have nothing on Death," she told it.

The pages turned themselves to nearly the end of the book. There was one longer spell on the left page, something about inviting witches into your home, and on the right was a rhyming couplet and a sketch of a person. Anathema blinked. No, a sketch of a demon. With… bunny ears? 

Stairs creaking behind her heralded Aziraphale's return. "Anathema dear, so sorry about that. Now, what were we discussing - Oh, no."

"It fell off by itself," Anathema said, rushed, reflexive. Then she blew out a breath. She would not be intimidated. "It looks incredibly dark, though, Aziraphale, I'm not sure that you want to put it back on the shelf-"

"Don't touch it!"

Of course, the admonition came too late. Anathema could not see him because he was standing behind her, but Aziraphale's voice was sharp and commanding. Or would have been commanding, if Anathema found Aziraphale at all imposing. He did startle her, though, so her hand came down on the book harder than intended. When her fingers grazed the page it felt like it _bit_ her. She yanked her hand back, and also opened her mouth to yelp.

Except she didn't yell. Instead she saw a speck of her own blood on the page and heard her own voice saying, _"Witch calls to witch, blood calls to blood, till the sun sets on this day, in my home may you stay."_

Then, as a line of black light cut from the ceiling down to the floor, she heard Aziraphale mutter, "Should have chained that one up."

"What on Earth-"

"Nothing for it, Anathema, come back here now," Aziraphale said. His hand gently curled around her arm and less gently tugged her backward, reaching past her to grab onto the book. He brought it with them, several feet away from the rapidly-expanding portal of darkness spilling smoky shadows onto the bookshop floor.

It was the first time she'd looked at the cover, and it was _looking back at her._

She stepped away from Aziraphale and touched her glasses as if settling them on her face would make the _eyeball_ in the cover of the book go away. It did not. The book had no mouth, no nose, no eyebrow, nothing with which to make a facial expression, but Anathema thought the eye gleamed in a way that suggested laughter. It also tracked her when she inched backwards along a bookcase.

"Aziraphale."

"It's all right," Aziraphale said back. He was not looking at her. He was looking at the portal, which now filled the aisle between the shelves. His face was blank. It made his eyes seem … cold. "Anathema, dear, do you have your mobile?"

Her hand went reflexively to her pocket. "Yes, but why-"

"Call Crowley, will you?" In his arm the book tried to flap its cover open, and he clamped it down with his free hand.

A foot stepped out of the portal, in a low-heeled black shoe.

"I don't have his number," Anathema started to protest. But there in her contacts was Crowley's name, all right, which she supposed she should've expected. He was listed as Anthony J. Crowley for some reason. She shook her head and dialed, preemptively switching it over to speakerphone. "What's the J stand for?"

"Just a J, really," Aziraphale said, distractedly.

A green skirt billowed out in front of the next foot, and as a person emerged out of the shadows, two more followed behind her, in red and in purple. The portal winked shut behind them.

The witch - Anathema was sure they must be witches, or else why the spell? - in green looked around the aisle and settled a hand on her hip. Her eyes rested on Aziraphale before skipping over to Anathema. She raised one eyebrow.

"Well," she said, "you're certainly better dressed than some of the witches we're getting in Hell these days."

"Excuse you," Anathema said.

_"You're the one who called me,"_ Crowley sputtered. He'd picked up the phone, but Anathema didn't know what to say to him. And anyway, she was busy trading glares with the witch in green, who had a tower of red hair on her head and who the other two witches were hovering behind. _"Wait. Anathema? How did you get this number?"_

"I gave it to her. Be a dear and join us at the shop, please," Aziraphale said. "We have company."

_"Angel, what is that supposed to mean?"_ Crowley's voice was suddenly sharp. The traffic sounds in the back of the call picked up, louder. Anathema could hear squealing tires.

"Crowley?" The red-headed witch looked over at Aziraphale again. "You know demons! We were sure that one would be dead."

Aziraphale lifted his chin. "He isn't."

_"Who the Heaven is that?"_ Crowley hissed.

"Allow me to introduce my sisters and myself. Let's silence that contraption, we don't need it," the witch said. Behind her the brown-haired one said something too quietly to hear and made a zipping motion across her mouth, which caused the phone to go dark in Anathema's hand. No amount of button mashing would make the screen light up again.

"No need," Aziraphale said. Anathema gave up on her phone and shoved it back into her pocket. When she looked at him, he seemed to be forcibly holding the cover of the book closed. "I know who you are, Winifred Sanderson."

"I don't," Anathema reminded him.

"My sisters Mary," apparently-Winifred said, gesturing at the brown-haired witch, and then at the blonde one, "and Sarah were the foremost witches of Salem, in our time."

_"I've_ never heard of you."

Anathema stepped forward to stand next to Aziraphale, and maybe just an inch or two ahead. Sure, he was an angel with some kind of power, but these were witches. Anathema knew from witches. And Winifred was looking at her, anyway, not Aziraphale. The blonde one - Sarah? - _was_ peering out from behind Winifred's shoulder, squinting at Aziraphale appraisingly. Which he ignored.

"We were unjustly executed. Cut down in our prime," Winifred said.

"We were hanged, actually," Mary corrected. Winifred looked briefly pained. Sarah was apparently done with Aziraphale and scuttled around behind her sisters to peer appraisingly at Anathema, which Anathema also chose to ignore.

She said, "They tried to kill my ancestor for being a witch, too. I know witches. I've never heard of any Sandersons."

"Young people nowadays," Winifred said. "Who was your ancestor?"

"Agnes Nutter."

Winifred flicked her hand dismissively. "Never heard of her."

"She," Anathema said firmly, "took down every single one of the bastards - sorry, Aziraphale - who came to watch her die, with gunpowder and nails packed into her skirts. What did you do?"

Sarah bounced up, nearly toppling Mary over. Winifred shoved her back. Her hair covered her face and she brushed it away, flashing long nails that looked like talons. "We cursed a candle to bring us back!"

Anathema looked at Aziraphale, who shrugged.

"It had to be lit by a virgin," Mary added, as if that was helpful.

Aziraphale let out a breath. He adjusted his grip on the book, and Winifred's eyes settled on his hands. The end of the aisle where she and her sisters stood seemed more shadowy than it had been a moment before.

"I believe you have something that belongs to me." Winifred smiled slowly. She stretched one hand out before her and sang, _"Book!"_

The Book lurched in Aziraphale's grip. Anathema threw an arm out in front of him to keep him from sliding forward. He took half a step back and she moved herself fully between him and the witches. She wished her bread knife wasn't all the way in her bag.

Still. She started skimming the titles of the books on either side of her. There had to be something she could throw without it upsetting Aziraphale too much.

"That's enough of that, Winifred," Aziraphale said.

Winifred made some gesture and Anathema felt the angel bump into her again. She planted her feet on the floor and squared her shoulders, trying to be as solid as possible.

Aziraphale murmured thanks before looking back at the sisters and saying, "This is pointless. I heard the incantation. It only gives you until the end of daylight, and that's in three hours."

It was actually in slightly less than one hour, because it was winter in London and Anathema had come over for afternoon tea, but Anathema wasn't about to correct him. He must have a reason for telling them that. She realized that meant Aziraphale had lied. Silently, she filed away the question of angels lying for later.

"And who are you, to be _holding_ my Book and calling me by name and educating me my own spells?" Winifred demanded. She took a step forward. Her sisters came with her.

"If you must know, your Book went on at length about you, when I first acquired it," Aziraphale said. Anathema was glad that she'd stepped in front of him because it meant she couldn't look down at the Book. She really, really didn't want to double-check it for anything resembling a mouth.

"Who were you to be acquiring it at all? You certainly are not a witch. You don't seem like a demon either."

Sarah tugged at Winifred's sleeve. "Winnie."

"And only a witch should be able to hear the Book."

"Winnie!"

"It was a gift from Satan Himself."

Aziraphale raised both eyebrows. "I rather doubt that."

"Winnie! Winnie Winnie Winnie!"

"Shut her up, Mary," Winifred ordered. She tapped her nails against the side of her face while Mary and Sarah started scrabbling at each other. There was dress-pulling and hair-pulling, and Winifred wore the exasperated look of the eldest sibling through all of it. "I assure you it was."

"The handwriting on the first spells is far too legible to be Satan's," Aziraphale reasoned, reasonably, like a reasonable person who had just critiqued Satan's penmanship. "The rest were clearly added later with normal writing implements. The earlier ones must have been from whatever demon was bored enough to be making spellbooks for Satanist witches' hearths."

Anathema and Winifred simultaneously asked, "What?"

Sarah bit down on Mary's hand, which had been clamped over her mouth. "He's an _angel,_ Winnie!"

Winifred and not Anathema asked, "What?!"

"I can tell because he looks the exact opposite to the demons we've met," Sarah chirped. "Also the little witch called him Aziraphale, which isn't a real name," she said, which got her a huff from Aziraphale's corner. She grinned and added, "And the Crowley voice box called him 'angel,' too."

Her sisters looked at each other and then at Aziraphale. Sarah beamed happily from behind them.

"Oh, fine. Yes, she's correct." He sighed.

Winifred sucked in a sharp breath and shoved both her sisters backwards. Since they were at the end of the aisle, it meant she squished them up against the wall. Mary let out a pained noise and Sarah whined and tried to bite Winifred's arm.

"Sisters, gather yourselves. This sorry excuse for a witch has summoned us into a divine lair!"

"Lair is hardly the word I'd choose," Aziraphale said.

"I am a great witch! And I'm sure I'm more psychic than all of you put together," Anathema said. "And I don't go around putting skin and eyeballs into books. I use paper, like a normal person."

"Watch your words, little witch," Winifred snapped.

Which was precisely when Crowley came tearing up the stairs.

Anathema didn't have to turn her aura-vision on, she could _feel_ Crowley's. A huge serpentine thing leaping out in front of him to strike across the room and down the aisle where they stood. Someone who was not a witch would have flinched (or someone who was not Anathema, since all three of the Sandersons did flinch). Anathema, however, had seen the tiny smile on Aziraphale's face.

She inched closer to Aziraphale, so as Crowley's aura coiled protectively around them both, it didn't have to stretch far.

"Winnie, that's him!" Mary shook Winifred's arm. "He isn't dead!"

"He _isn't,_" Sarah breathed. There was a worrying sparkle in her eyes.

"I told you he wasn't," Aziraphale said.

Crowley came to a halt at Aziraphale's elbow, catching himself on the bookshelf. The solid presence of his aura vanished as Aziraphale kissed his cheek hello. But Anathema was pretty sure it had all been for a first impression anyway. He looked at the witches, glanced at Aziraphale, did a double-take at the Book, gave Anathema a look that suggested he expected _her_ to know what was going on for some reason, and then looked at Aziraphale again.

"Angel, I was expecting demons, not witches."

"You don't have to say it like that," Anathema said.

He grimaced. "Not you, you don't-"

He gestured at Sarah, who was biting her lip and looking at him like she wanted to eat him. Maybe literally? It was hard to tell. Anathema had seen that lotion recipe calling for actual skin, who knew what these people thought was appetizing.

Winifred, on the other hand, seemed to be restraining herself from sneering. "You're the one who knew us."

Crowley's nose wrinkled. "Never seen you before."

"Yes you have," Aziraphale said. "You told me, Crowley. About meeting the Sandersons in Hell. Before your trial."

Crowley stared at Aziraphale. Anathema couldn't read his eyes behind his glasses. She thought she probably didn't need to. "Oh, yeah," he said, deadpan. "I forgot. It was a busy day. Hauled up in front of all the demons of Hell. Nearly getting destroyed."

"So you can see how it took a moment to remember," Aziraphale said.

"Constantly forgetting things, me. Mind like a sieve."

While they were talking Winifred blinked several times. Behind her, Mary pinched Sarah's arm, glaring, and Sarah slapped back at her. Winifred ignored the both of them. Coming to some sort of a decision, she tilted her head and touched her hands together at her fingertips. "Master Crowley," she said, syrup-sweet. Crowley made a low groan in the back of his throat, but she appeared not to hear it. "My sisters and I have been denizens of Hell for some several hundred years now, and since we have been lucky enough to run into you-"

"Yeah. I'm not really, eh, the person for that."

"Perhaps we could assist you with the …subjugation… of this angel," Winifred suggested, which made Crowley groan again and Anathema cringe. Aziraphale just rolled his eyes. "You see, I still have a connection to my Book, and I need to bring it back to Hell with me."

"This book? With the eyeball?" Crowley looked at it, and then up at Aziraphale, who smiled at him. The demon turned back to Winifred. "That's not happening."

"Whyever not?"

"Even if I still worked for Hell, which I do not, and even if I did things for Satanic witches, which I never did, I'm not trying to take a book from him." Crowley indicated Aziraphale with his thumb.

Aziraphale smiled again.

"Sister witch," Winifred began.

"Don't look at me," Anathema said. "I'm an occultist, not a Satanist."

"Modern witches," Winifred muttered under her breath. "I simply must have the Book. It _is_ mine, it was gifted to me by Satan Himself-"

_"That_ thing? Nah." Slouching, Crowley stuck his hands in his pockets. "The stitching is shoddy. Plus, it's way too on the nose for the Boss."

Aziraphale sighed and murmured, "I do wish you would stop calling him that."

"Do you want me to go back to Lucifer Morningstar?"

Next to Winifred, Mary looked back and forth between the angel and the demon, who continued to argue about the best way to refer to Satan. Sarah was poking at various books on the shelf next to her and yanking her hand back every time like some holy essence left in the shop shocked her with each touch. Winifred pressed her hands to her temples.

Anathema was the only one watching when Mary whispered to herself, "Serpent spine, I make thee mine, let thy true form shine-"

So when Crowley jerked upright, his posture snapping straight, Aziraphale was caught off guard and even the other witches didn't know what was happening. And Anathema's bread knife was all the way across the room. Her dead cell phone was still in her pocket, though. Her mother had instilled decent aim in Anathema as a child, and living in the same town as the Them for several years meant she had played more catch than anyone her age would be, otherwise.

Anyway. The point was, she barely had to think and still managed to hit Mary square between the eyes with the phone.

Mary squawked. The incantation cut off before it was finished. Sarah laughed, and Winifred grabbed her sister by the front of her dress, growling, "What were you thinking? You weren't, you never do! We need the Book to convince the demon who meets us in Hell to escort us to Master!"

Crowley shook himself and smiled, a flash of fang showing at the corners of his mouth. "Legion is really not going to do that, not if they want to keep their head," he said. "Also, this? This is over."

He snapped his fingers. All three of the Sandersons froze in place.

"My dear, are you quite alright?" Aziraphale asked.

"I'm fine. Angel, were you ever gonna tell me you have a Satanic spellbook?"

"You would've found it if you cared to look," Aziraphale demured. In his arms, the Book had shut its eye. Anathema thought that if it had actually had a mouth, it would be sighing.

And she didn't want to think about books with mouths. She squared her shoulders and marched forward while Aziraphale fussed over Crowley and Crowley fussed back about the kind-of-alive and apparently sentient Satanic spellbook. The phone had bounced off Mary's face and off the bookshelf, to rest on the floor. Anathema grimaced at the cracked screen but shoved it back into her pocket. Maybe she could fix it later.

"The spell is supposed to expire at sunset," she said, turning back around. She tucked a loose strand of hair behind one ear. "What do we do with them until then? Do they just vanish back to Hell?"

"Kinda," Crowley said.

***

At sunset there was a discordant noise. The lights dimmed. When they brightened again, Legion stood between some bookshelves. This one was dressed all in black with a shimmery black scarf around their throat. They had the customary two stalks of hair on their head, which only someone who wanted to be hunted by ten thousand corporations of a single demon hive mind would refer to as bunny ears. Out loud, anyway.

They blinked, their long lower eyelashes fluttering against their face. "We were on our break!"

"You're a demon?" Anathema asked. She paused, and her eyes lit up. "Hey! Your picture was in the Book."

Crowley was glad he'd claimed the couch. He'd draped himself over it fifteen minutes ago. Legion blinked, obviously taken aback at being greeted so casually by a human. Crowley did not bother to get off the couch or even to sit up. Not that Legion's presence had ever made Crowley willing to get off a couch, but now it had the added benefit of knowing Legion couldn't complain to Beelzebub about it. Nobody would be making marks in Crowley's record anymore.

"What Book?" Legion asked, instead of, _Beware, for we are Legion,_ which Crowley happened to know was how Legion's aspects generally greeted humans.

Anathema waved at Aziraphale, who had started back up the stairs at the sound of Legion popping into existence.

"Aziraphale! Go back to the spell, the one that called the Sandersons here. I want to see the sketch of the demon that was next to it."

Legion whipped around, saw Aziraphale, and took several steps backward. It meant they walked directly into the low table Aziraphale had set up between the chairs and the couch. Crowley snickered to himself.

At the top of the stairs Aziraphale paused. He had the Book under one arm, unwilling to let go of it until the Sandersons were gone. In his other hand he held his white mug. Crowley could smell from here that he'd ended up making cocoa instead of more tea.

"Uh," Legion said. They glanced at Crowley, who stretched his arms above his head languorously. "Crowley, where _are_ we?"

"My bookshop," Aziraphale said. Then, to Anathema, "I am not showing them the sketch, Anathema. I don't want them to take the Book back to Hell."

"I don't know," Anathema said. "They seem kind of terrified of you, honestly."

Legion bared their teeth. And also inched around the table, so it was between them and Aziraphale.

Crowley figured this more than made up for Aziraphale dropping 'Oh, don't you remember meeting the Sanderson sisters?' in his lap today. If Legion had actually followed through on hitting 'Aziraphale' in Heaven, like they'd asked the Archangels' permission to do, Crowley would be more bothered by their presence here. Still, he probably shouldn't smirk, or Legion might get half a clue.

"Well, you do," Anathema said.

"We do not," Legion hissed. "We are Legion. We are many. Don't think you can trifle with demons, human."

"Uh-huh." Anathema picked up her cup of tea. She threw a significant look at Crowley that Crowley did not like at all. "So you've come to walk the witches back to Hell?"

"Do you want to come with them?" Legion demanded.

Behind them, Aziraphale sighed. Crowley waved him over and twisted on the couch to let Aziraphale sit. Then he dropped his legs across Aziraphale's lap. The angel looked baffled for a brief moment about what to do with the cocoa and the Book, but ended up tucking the Book between himself and the arm of the couch. He cupped his cocoa in both hands.

"Not particularly," Anathema was saying.

"Witches," Legion spat. "You're all impossible."

"Thanks? Also, I'm an occultist, not a Satanist."

"Oh." The demon blew out a breath and fell into the unoccupied chair next to Anathema. "Thank fuck," they said, which made Aziraphale's eyes narrow and Anathema blink several times. "Can't keep a straight face around those people. It's all, dark Father this, dark anti-blessings that, dark blah blah blah."

"You are dressed in all black."

"Yeah, but we don't go around sharing dark memes on dark Facebook."

For a moment Anathema struggled silently. Crowley folded his hands across his stomach. He wondered if he could kick the Book off the couch before Aziraphale could do anything about it, but decided that getting the angel's hands off a Satanist spellbook probably wouldn't be worth it in the end. Trying to take any written material away from Aziraphale was asking for trouble.

Finally Anathema asked, her shoulders braced like she was already regretting it, "What's the difference between Facebook and Dark Facebook?"

"It's dark Facebook, no capital, and there isn't. A difference." Legion looked at Crowley again. They blanched at the sight of Crowley sprawled across Aziraphale. Clearing their throat, they gestured at the frozen witches up against the far wall. "So did you summon them or what?"

"I wasn't even in the _neighborhood,_" Crowley said. "Blame this one, didn't chain the Book up."

"I can get a chain," Aziraphale reasoned.

Legion did not look pleased about that. "It's going to be a pain, bringing three of them back downstairs. Can't you help?"

Crowley raised one eyebrow. "Do I look like I am going back downstairs?" he asked.

Legion sighed.

As they walked over to the end of the aisle where the Sandersons were stuck, a thread-thin black line appeared in the air. Legion flicked a finger against it and it vibrated, letting out a twang. Then they tugged at it, slowly pulling it open from different spots, so that it lay parallel to a bookshelf and left open a view of the Sandersons. Aziraphale watched the entire operation with a wary expression. Crowley kept his legs firmly across Aziraphale's lap, because he didn't need interference with a call back to Hell.

"So how does that work?" Anathema stood.

"You really don't want to know," Crowley said.

Anathema frowned, but sat back down as Legion plunged their arm into the darkness up to the shoulder. Legion muttered to themself and hit the edge of the portal several times with their free hand. It popped open another foot. They pulled their arm out, shaking off pins and needles.

"Aziraphale," Anathema said. "Are you sure you don't want the Book to go to Hell? I got a look at its aura, and it is very dark. I can't imagine it isn't affecting the other books in some way." She paused. "Also, it literally has an eyeball in it."

Aziraphale took a sip of his cocoa. "I'll take better care to lock it up this time. I should have done it when I first acquired it, I know, but time got away from me. Don't worry, Anathema, I'm well versed in handling dark things. I'm not concerned."

"Oi," Crowley said. "That supposed to mean something?"

Aziraphale sighed. "Legion, are you nearly finished? I would really like to get these people out of my shop."

Legion swallowed. "Just a second," they said. They took a step back from the portal, inhaled, and kicked it very hard right in the center.

It finished spreading out with an audible thrumming, almost like music.

"Okay." They clapped their hands together. "You're going to have to unfreeze them."

Crowley reluctantly swung his legs off Aziraphale's lap and strode over to the portal. "They wanted to retrieve the Book so you'd take them to Satan, FYI," he muttered, low enough that it wouldn't carry. Legion groaned, loud enough that it definitely was audible to the others. Crowley rolled his eyes.

"Easy for you. You're not the ones that always gets sent to the witch prison when things go wrong. If it's not getting chased by a mutant deer with a mind-controlling fungus infection, it's getting…" Legion shuddered. "...Satanic orgy invitations."

"Your existence is hard," Crowley said. "Maybe if you indulge them once, they'll stop asking."

Legion glared like a person who really had ten thousand sets of eyes, even if only one was there right then.

Crowley snapped his fingers.

Sarah must have been in the middle of losing her balance when he'd frozen them, because she toppled over, face-down, onto the floor. She blew her hair out of her face and propped herself up on her elbows. Winifred continued to berate Mary, uninterrupted, neither of them noticing Legion. Sarah definitely noticed Legion. Sarah blinked, and then smiled and raised a hand to wiggle her fingers at them.

"Back in the portal," Legion said, flatly.

The sound of their voice made Winifred stop. She dropped the front of Mary's dress and smoothed out her own, putting a pretty expression on her face. "Legion," she purred. "So good to see you again."

Wordlessly, Legion pointed at the portal.

"Before we go, which of course we will, can't _wait_ to return to the Enclave after being so rudely summoned here," Winifred said. In the background Anathema shouted _Hey!_ "Before we go, we do have one request, just a small one."

"We don't do requests."

"Master Crowley," Winifred tried. Legion made a choking sound. Crowley shut his eyes behind his glasses. "All I want is to properly thank Master Satan for His very generous gift. I am sure He does appreciate being thanked. Perhaps you could put in a word for us?"

Legion looked at Crowley, Crowley could feel it. He cracked one eye open and Legion started laughing, pressing a fist to their mouth.

"Told you," Crowley said, through clenched teeth. "Don't work for Hell anymore. Totally useless to you."

"Oh," Winifred said, blinking.

"Back-" Legion swallowed another burst of laughter, dropped their voice, and gestured at the portal again. "Back down, now."

Winifred looked between the both of them before seeming to deflate. Mary picked up her skirts and stepped over Sarah to walk gingerly back into the portal. There was no noise, but she vanished instantly.

Sarah reached out with one hand and drew a fingertip along Legion's shoe. "You should stay, when we get back," she said, grinning. "We have tea, and heart cakes, and-"

Now it was Crowley's turn to laugh, because Legion recoiled so violently they took an entire step backwards. "Into the portal," they barked.

At least Winifred had the sense to grab Sarah by the arm and haul her upright. Sarah was still making moon-eyes at Legion as her sister began to shove her into the portal, and she even spared a second to rake her eyes over Crowley in a deeply alarming way, but then Winifred shoved her through and that was over.

"I will be speaking to someone about this," Winifred said, putting one foot into the portal. "Not the reception we were promised at all."

"Feel like you probably weren't promised anything," Crowley said.

Winifred sent him a withering look. Then she tilted her head, stuck out one hand, and sang, _"Bo-ok!"_

On the couch Aziraphale still had the Book wedged up against his side. But both of his hands were wrapped around his cocoa mug. He gasped as the Book flung itself into the air and dashed across the shop. Anathema leapt to her feet and tried to grab it, but it was too fast, and the table was in her way. She nearly tripped over it. By the time she righted herself the Book had zoomed between Legion and Crowley to land square in Winifred's hand, and then Winifred was winking and through the portal entirely.

For a minute, nobody said anything.

Then Crowley looked at Legion. "Well, some kind of luck with that," he said. He turned around and walked back to the couch.

"You aren't going to help at all?!"

"Fired!" Crowley announced, with a celebratory fist pump.

"See you never, we guess," Legion spat.

"Bye!" Anathema called.

The portal disappeared as soon as the demon was through it. The bookshop looked just the same, minus an obvious gap on one of the shelves where the Book must have been all this time.

Crowley dropped himself back onto the couch, where Aziraphale was staring at the place the portal had been, mouth open. He lay his legs back over Aziraphale's lap. "Aw, angel. I'd say I'd make it up to you but I absolutely won't. Really don't understand why you bought a Satanic spellbook in the first place."

Aziraphale closed his mouth. He hunched over his cocoa. "I never said I _bought_ it."

"Angel," Crowley said, smirking.

Aziraphale's cheeks went pink.

"Okay," Anathema said. "Think I'm gonna leave now. Thanks for having me."

***

"We demand to meet Master." Winifred brandished the Book at Legion.

The demon had grabbed a mop from the hallway and was holding it straight out to fend Sarah off with the pointy end.

Winifred and her sisters had walked quite a bit away from the door into the Witch Enclave before Legion had come through the portal. So if the demon wanted them back in that prison, they'd need to figure out how to turn them all around. Winifred was betting on that being too much work. She knew how to be annoying enough to make people do what she wanted. She had Mary and Sarah for sisters, after all.

"It won't be but a moment of your time," Winifred continued. "Just take us there and we'll be out of your hair for good."

One of Legion's eyes twitched. "A moment before this one of us gets discorporated, sure. We keep telling you: Satan. Does. Not. Take. Visitors."

This was truly absurd. Winifred pulled the Book to her chest and stroked its cover, tutting at it while the eye darted back and forth. It must remember being in Hell even though it was highly unlikely to have been in this particular hallway. The Book had come with several spells already, simple things any witch worth her gizzards could do, probably even that modern one who made friends of angels. The rest of the pages had been filled in over time by various Sanderson sisters.

The Book looked straight at Winifred and blinked. "I agree," she said.

She looked at Legion. "If you refuse to take us to see Master, then you must at least take us to meet the craftsdemon who bound the Book. You can't possibly try to claim it was made by mortal hands."

Winifred turned the Book around so it could flutter its eyelid at the demon. Or judging from the expression on Legion's face, do something approaching but not meeting the definition of flutter. The original bookbinder had not thought to give the Book eyelashes. Maybe, if Winifred met them, she could ask for an upgrade.

Legion looked at the Book for what felt like ages before finally lowering the mop.

Sarah twined her hands together behind her back and gave them a coy look, which Legion completely ignored. 

"Can't quite do that," they said, slowly, flinging the mop up again when Winifred began to protest. "That demon ... isn't around anymore. But we can introduce you to the next worst one."

"One makes due," Winifred said, under her breath.

The walk to the next worst demon did, actually, take ages.

They followed Legion in single-file through empty hallways before veering into a passage packed full of demons. The lighting was awful, barely any of it to speak of. Strange liquids dripped from the ceiling. The signs on the walls made no sense. This must have been the back way for, hmm, lesser demons.

All of them pressed to one side of the hall to make way for Legion and the Sandersons, even when it meant demons clambering on top of each other to get out of the way.

Winifred picked her chin up and cast smug smiles in that hall. Finally, some recognition of the power she and her sisters posed. But mostly she.

At last the crowd thinned. Legion turned left four times in a row, but they didn't end up back in with the mass of demons. Instead they were at the bottom of a narrow staircase so tall and so poorly lit that the steps disappeared into the dark.

"How long will it take to climb that?" she asked. Mary groaned behind her and even Sarah made a pout at the sight.

"We don't know, we've never done it," Legion said. They grinned. It was the first thing like a real smile Winifred had seen on their face. "Us commoners aren't allowed up there. Nobility only."

"Oh!" That was pleasing. "And who will we be introducing ourselves to?"

"The demon who made that Book isn't here anymore. He was a Duke of Hell, Ligur. But you can walk right up to his worst acquaintance, Duke Hastur. Just don't tell him we sent you, got it?" Legion said. They looked up the stairs and back at Winifred, the grin gone. "Not procedure, you know. This is a special favor. Between us."

"Our lips are sealed," Winifred said. She even made a gesture as if locking them and tossing away the key.

"Great. Up you go."

Legion waved her and Mary up and used the broom to keep Sarah from trying to shake their hand. Or whatever it was that Sarah was hoping to do before climbing the stairs.

It didn't matter, Winifred thought. She began taking deep and deliberate breaths while they climbed. There was no way to tell how much progress they might have been making. The top of the staircase remained dark. But the Book was in her grip, and when she got tired, perhaps they could sit and rest. At the end of the journey they would at last be meeting a demon who could get things done. It had only taken over three hundred years.

But what was three hundred years in the Witch Enclave measured against eternity with the nobility of Hell?


End file.
